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One of the first items I coveted from the East Bloc was a pressing of a Beatles’ album on the Soviet state record label Melodiya. On the infrequent occasions that reports about Soviet underground culture appeared in North American media, one would often find mention of Western popular music and its role in fostering an alternative mindset to that prevailing in the Soviet mainstream. All Western artists seemed to have their acolytes in the Soviet Union and there was still a scent of danger associated with listening to this music in that context – at least that’s how it was presented to us.

The Beatles’ “A Hard Day’s Night” LP as licensed for release by Melodiya, the largest Soviet record label.

When I embarked on trip to Russia in 1996, acquiring a Melodiya pressing of a Beatles’ LP was at the top of my “to do” list. Forget the Hermitage, Red Square, the Kremlin: I need a vinyl fix. In Moscow I spent a rainy morning battling the effects of food poisoning given me by the Canadian Embassy (!) unsuccessfully trolling through the famous open air in Filovsky Park. In St. Petersburg, we were able to connect with a young film student who offered walking tours of the city and I enlisted him in my quest.

Off the Map and Underground: Western Music in Soviet Siberia

Peter confirmed that Western pop/rock music had indeed been an important part of escaping the realities of everyday life in the Soviet Union and told me how he and some friends gained entry to an informal group of music fans in his Siberian hometown of Samara (a key centre in the Soviet military-industrial complex which appeared on none of their maps). I remember a story of him taking a streetcar out to the end of the line one Saturday morning and then trudging out to find a cluster of garages where a group of music fans supposedly met. Read More

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Perry Friedman was a folksinger from western Canada who emigrated to the GDR in the late 1950s and went on to play an important role in the East German cultural scene by introducing the country to a number of folk music traditions – including their own.

I first came across Friedman’s name when I stumbled on his obituary in the German newspaper taz in the spring of 1995. The mention of a Canadian banjo player and young Communist who had settled in East Germany in the late 1950s struck me as too bizarre to be true. (To the tune of Sting’s “Englishman in New York”: I’m Canadian, a Communist Canadian, Playing banjo in East Berlin!)

Perry Friedman on the cover of the 1966 Amiga release Songs, Chansons und neue Lieder, a collection of songs by participants in the GDR’s Sing Movement

Intrigued, I began pursuing the story with an eye to writing a piece for publication in Canada. After some digging, I was able to track down some of his family and associates and I ended up speaking with his sister-in-law, Sylvia Friedman, a colleague from the CBC in the 1970s, Lorne Tulk, and exchanged letters with a relative of his mother’s second husband. These filled in some of the blanks, but Read More

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In 1987 Amiga released a self-titled album by English singer-songwriter Billy Bragg, the contents of which were made up of the artist’s highly-acclaimed second record Talking With the Taxman About Poetry. This record is striking for the way in which it Bragg manages to wed the political to the personal without coming off as heavy handed.

Billy Bragg – S/T (Amiga release, 1987) – front cover – My copy is autographed and Billy added a “voice from the crowd” yelling “Go Away!”, a reference to his having been kicked out the GDR in 1989 for criticizing the Berlin Wall.

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The Amiga pressing of Bruce Springsteen‘s Born in the U.S.A. album appeared in 1986 and was one of the prime examples of the socialist regime’s attempts to court East German youth. Given Springsteen’s working class roots and image, it might seem that it would not have been a huge stretch for GDR authorities to approve him for presentation their impressionable youth. However, the context of this decision is remarkable for, at that time, Springsteen represented for many – rightly or wrongly – a nostalgic, apolitical image of the United States and its values.

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Pink Floyd‘s 1973 album Dark Side of the Moon received a licensed reissue through Amiga in 1979. The Amiga release is a stereo album, but it was pressed from the quadraphonic masters. Like many other massively popular Western rock bands, Floyd was well known and liked in East Germany. I picked up this copy at the used record store in Leipzig in 1999.

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As the 1980s progressed, the number of Amiga Western-licensed released increased quite dramatically. In addition to Foreigner‘s Records compilation album, Amiga also released hit records by Michael Jackson (Thriller), Tina Turner (Private Dancer), Dire Straits, Styx, AC/DC, Whitesnake, ZZ Top to name but a few. As this list suggests, ideological affinity appears to have been loosened considerably as a criteria for identifying Western artists appropriate for exposure to the GDR’s impressionable youth.

Foreigner – Records (Amiga release, 1987)

A quick reading of the sleeve notes found on the back of Records confirms suspicions that the licensing process was no longer slave to cultural politics as the essay here focuses solely on the band’s history.